


i'd set them to verse so i'd always remember

by elijah_was_a_prophet



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/F, Possessive Sex, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:28:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26148712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elijah_was_a_prophet/pseuds/elijah_was_a_prophet
Summary: Twenty years, and no less beloved.
Relationships: Astoria Greengrass/Daphne Greengrass
Comments: 3
Kudos: 22
Collections: RelationShipping 2020





	i'd set them to verse so i'd always remember

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lolahaze](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lolahaze/gifts).



_Dearest Astoria, could I tear you away for just a few days to my London home? I haven’t seen you since the birth of my nephew, and although I understand that you are not well, my personal Healer Madame Teagarden has agreed to take residence in the lower room for the duration of your stay if necessary. It would mean a great deal if you were to answer in the affirmative, and I eagerly turn down the sheets in anticipation of your arrival._

_Love, your beloved Sister Daphne_

The house on 4756 Cispontine Avenue was nondescript from the front, both to the Muggles it was enchanted against and the occasional magical visitor who happened to spot it while the solitary resident was coming or going. Unlike the other Greengrass properties it was modest enough to be within the range of a well-off business owner or senior Ministry employee. Father hadn’t yet passed and given the keys to the townhouse, the estate, or the beach retreat to his beloved daughters, so Astoria resided in Malfoy Manor and Daphne had her own small city dwelling. Bought with her saved allowance, none were allowed inside except the occasional necessary repairman and a cleaner every season change. Not even a house elf graced the halls, and for that she was seen as an intense eccentric by the extended family.

“Aunt Della said I shouldn’t be visiting,” Astoria said when she stepped out of the fireplace. Although the magic worked to throw off their ancestor’s wasting curse had succeeded, a lifetime of ill health and recent childbirth left her slower and weaker than her unaffected elder sister. She grabbed Daphne’s hands to keep her steady as she eased into a green and rose print chair.

“And who gave Aunt Della any authority?”

“You know how much mind Father gives her. She could say rain falls upwards and he’d consider it for a second.” She winced and rubbed her shoulder. “Where’s that Healer?”

“Not here. I might have fibbed, a little, so that Draco would let you come.”

“Draco’s not the problem. It’s that mother of his, always fussing, always asking me questions about Scorpius as if I haven’t got the sense to raise a child.”

“Mother in laws and their daughter in laws always disagree. And it’s her first grandchild.”

“And her only one. You couldn’t Imperius Curse me to go through that again.”

She was still rubbing at her shoulder. Daphne crossed the room and laid her hands on it, rubbing side to side in tight circles over the knots. Even through the sweater the layers of tension and stress were evident and she really tried to work her hands in deep, to push the muscles relaxed and release what must have been a constant source of pain.

“I didn’t make you up a fake room,” Daphne said as her hands slid forwards and to the neckline of Astoria’s shirt, pausing there to feel the warmth of her skin. “Nobody can enter without my permission, and nobody comes who might see more than they wish to.”

“No prying eyes...”

Astoria trailed off and pressed a kiss to Daphne’s wrist, her lips dry and cool. Once she’d been gripped by day long fevers, and Daphne had crawled into her bed to try and soothe her, but now it was like that fire had died and instead she was cold all the time. Her bed was always piled with many blankets, fur robes and knitted things and old jewel quits, and whenever she rose in the morning it was in an ankle length nightgown and a velvet robe.

Daphne knew these things because she’d made a habit of always staying in her sister’s room, sleeping in her bed and being sure to arise before the dawn as to not be caught. For the world would not understand how they loved, how blood bred a passionate heat more intense than that of any man’s words or stare, or how a protective instinct could turn carnal and yet remain pure.

“A full week, alone. Time to sit and eat breakfast together with no interruptions.”

“Time to sit together in the sunroom and talk.”

“Room for me in your bed.”

“There’s always been room.”

“Never room where I don’t have to flee before the crack of dawn. No late mornings where I could let your head rest on my shoulder.”

“You want that?”

“I have for many years.”

Astoria’s lips were still at Daphne’s wrist and she continued to kiss the skin there. Her warm breath was comforting in such a cold house- the magic that filled it with protection seemed to suck the heat out sometimes, and not even a roaring fire in the evenings could drive it away.

“Would you like to see our room, then? I tried to make some adjustments so that you might be more comfortable.”

Astoria stood, and waved her wand so that her bags might follow her up the stairs. They had been sitting on the first floor, and Daphne led her sister up past the second-floor bedrooms to a massive suite on the third with a four-poster bed. The carpet was richly patterned Persian in salmon pink and ivy green, matching the bed pillow’s needlepoint depiction of woodland plants. There was a cowslip patterned-border above the baseboards and at the chair rail, framing the fern panel dado between them, and a oak leaf border along the ceiling with muted mustards to contrast the bright purples of the wisteria print fill.

“It’s very colorful,” Astoria said.

“The entire house is like that. Whoever did it put Unsticking charms on every piece, and I haven’t got the patience to try and magic it all away.”

“It adds a certain charm, I feel.”

“Like being trapped in one of those modern robe shops, I feel. The ones where every piece of fabric is a new print, and instead of a decent pointed hat they put on a polyester monstrosity with polka dots and three dangly bits.”

“Can’t forget the dangly bits, now can we?”

She laughed and set her luggage under the bed before scrambling on top of it, using the cedar chest at the footboard to help herself up. There were so many throws and pillows on the bed that she managed to disappear into them fairly quickly, with nothing left showing but a socked foot and a robe hem. Daphne leaped after her, pulling aside blankets and pillows until she found her sister curled up and blinking sleepily.

“You can’t stay awake for me?”

Astoria pressed her face into a silk pillow and sighed. “I’m still tired all the time, even when I’m supposed to be cured. Even when I sleep the baby’s somewhere near on my mind, or Draco asking when the baby has to be fed, or some family member asking when they’ll get to come see the baby. Nobody ever asks how I’m doing.”

“There’s a reason I invited you and you only here. You’re the only one I care to see.”

“No questions about the baby?”

“You know I dislike children.” Daphne smiled and kissed the corner of Astoria’s mouth. “Even as a child I couldn’t wait to grow up.”

“Mother always said you were childish.”

“Because I held your hand and she thought it was a sign I was too scared to go anywhere without you. But really I was afraid of where you’d go without me.”

“Wherever I go you’ll find me. My heart is a compass which points only in your direction-”

“-and my eyes see only your footsteps in the sand. We studied the same book of Gervaise Ollivander’s poetry that summer. There was only one book, and you read it with your forehead touched to mine.”

“The advantage of sisters is that everyone assumes all touch is equal.”

It had still scared Daphne the first time Astoria kissed her, the year she was twelve and it was the time of the Triwizard Tournament. Tipsy after a Christmas party where the only words on the adult’s lips had been about the possibility of Azkaban breaks, they’d stumbled into the same bed and stripped off their formal robes with nary a thought towards propriety. Even if their bodies were reaching the age at which viewing them became sexual and not childishly innocuous that line had never existed in their worlds. And so they stripped and pressed into bed, nose to nose, breast to breast, a line uncrossed until Astoria leaned over and kissed her.

Now in the present day they kissed again, for they were as close as the chambers of the heart and still beat as one. No matter what gulf of distance and time stretched between they circled back home like migrating birds, each given to being the other’s roost.

“Now, or later?”

“Why not both?”

“Now and we’ll have a late dinner, later and I’ll run you a bath.”

“You’re making the dinner?”

“I always do. Father says it’s unbecoming, but I refused to use a house elf like he suggested. It’s simply not in good consciousness to do so in this time.”

“You know how slow they are to change. Narcissa and Draco get into the most awful rows about pureblood law, and how Draco doesn’t want Scorpius to go to Dies Natalis Solis Invicti since he thinks it has the wrong sort.”

“Never thought I’d see the day where the top of pureblood society was called the wrong sort.”

“Things changed after the war.” She put her head in the perfect curve of Daphne’s neck and breathed in deeply. “This didn’t. Selfish as it is, I’m glad you never got married.”

“Why would I? I’m in love with you.”

She pressed her hand to her sternum in shock. “But Daphne-”

“I’m not lonely, if that’s what you’re worried about. I knew what my life would be like if I loved someone I could never be seen with. However, this scant time we have together, these precious few days- they mean more to me than any number of years of marriage to someone who isn’t you.”

Overcome, Astoria kissed Daphne. Her thin hands grabbed at her sister’s dark hair, slightly lighter than her own black, and she pressed their bodies so close together as to be like two gloved hands. There was still the fabric separating them, and she knew that she’d rather have her fully nude later, but to have something so close yet untouchable was pure torture.

It was like their family holidays, where it was expected that Astoria and Daphne would sit together on the family settee and look proper for the yearly painting. Her sister’s hand would rest on her thigh and she’d be set alright; her sister’s hair would ghost over her neck and she’d want her, right then and there. Under their Father’s watchful eye they ate formal dinners around a table four feet apart- the two of them, him, their dowager great aunt, and their mother’s unmarried brother who they said was a bit of a fop.

At this dinner table they would be close enough to run their feet up each other’s legs. She smiled at the thought and kissed Daphne again.

Daphne was skilled in the kitchen, more skilled than Astoria had given her credit for. She watched as crisp marrows were made into soup, French beans and potatoes were boiled, and custard puddings were baked.

“Could you go down to the pantry and get a jar of mint preserves? I need it for the lamb sauce.”

The pantry was a small dark room, crowded with jars. Astoria felt certain that she saw pickled octopus and a live pink lungwort among its contents. At her home all the cooking was done by automatic spells- the self-boiling soup pot was a popular one- and so her own pantry was an ignored place.

When she came up the stairs Daphne was coming down the steps from the bedrooms, something wrapped in cloth and held in her hand.

“You can say if you want it or not, but since we’re alone, I thought you might want to try having something inside you while I’m busy.”

“We tried that once already.”

“And you liked it, up until the sudden trip to the Yaxley’s. But now there’s no aunts to drag us to tea while you squirm. Only me.”

Astoria hesitated, then nodded. She pulled up the hem of her robe, past her knees and over her hips, spreading her legs so Daphne could reach in and press the plug into her cunt. A small hook extended from the neck that pressed solidly on her clit. While it was in she could walk comfortably, since the flared base kept it in her body, but the minute she sat at the kitchen table to eat it was stretching her out and pushing her clit up into her pelvis.

A bowl of soup, roast lamb with mint sauce, little dishes of buttery green beans and potatoes, all lovingly piled onto her plate while Daphne’s foot pressed into her calf. She ate and still didn’t feel full, edged and desperate for her sister’s touch.

“Would you like some coffee?” Daphne asked after custard and her raspberry-currant tart. “Port, gin, wine?”

“No thank you.”

“At least have a cup of tea.”

“I’m fine, really.”

“Nothing? You just want to go to bed?”

“Please,” she begged.

“Alright, we can go.”

That was a lie. Daphne insisted on doing the dishes, formal velvet robe removed so that she was in just her silky slip that clung to the curves of her body. She was shorter than Astoria but well built, a body made strong by the work with magical creatures she’d gotten into after Hogwarts. Water dripped down her wrists and onto the fabric, making it shape to her body even tighter, making her nipples harden, the planes of her shoulder shifting, her cunt barely visible when she leaned down to put pots on the bottom shelves.

There was a wet mess sticking Astoria’s thighs together by the time they went up the stairs into the bathroom. Daphne undressed her and knelt to lick it off that thin skin, darkened by friction.

“Over a year,” she murmured, and bit hard into the softest, meatiest part.

“Daphne-!”

“Shhh.” She bit again, dragging her teeth out so they left rough red lines. “The bath’s almost full. We can talk about it then.”

While there were bathtubs in the Malfoy manor they filled via magic and stayed at a constant temperature for the duration, which was disappointing for someone who wanted the full range. Going from the too-hot steam that turned the skin pink to a comfortable warmth to tepid water which seemed to draw heat from the body was one of the pleasures of soaking.

Daphne sat down first and then pulled her sister into her lap. Her hands slid up around Astoria’s body to cup her breasts.

“They’re bigger.”

“Pregnancy does that, even if you get a wet nurse.”

“A wet nurse?”

“The Healer said my body was too weak to produce enough milk. But the growth stayed.”

“I like it.” She bounced them in her palms to get an idea of the new size difference. “I remember when you first kissed me they’d barely grown, and you were so worried because all the other second years were staring to need bustiers in their formal outfits.”

“I still remember you surprising me in my room.”

Twenty years later it still sent a flush up Astoria’s body to remember it. Alone in her dorm, sent to bed early to preserve her strength and feeling sorry for herself when she heard the door creak and Daphne come in, lit only by the low light of her wand. She’d laid very still as her sister crossed the room, until her sister’s hands pulled down a strap of her nightgown and she’d squeaked.

For what felt like hours after that- although it probably was only twenty minutes- Daphne kissed her barely-grown breasts, nipped them, twisted small bruises into the pale flesh and told Astoria how beautiful her body was growing. How good she’d look when she was fully grown. It was the first sexual experience she’d ever had besides rubbing on a pillow and it set a precedent. Her sister, once her playmate and guardian, was to be the one who would initiate everything from her first time having her breasts kissed to the first time she took a fist.

The latter, done the day after Draco asked for her hand in marriage, had been the first and only time she’d ever seen Daphne truly upset, and the ache had lasted for a week. It had also introduced her to how she liked an edge of pain.

“I want you to be rough,” Astoria said, grinding on Daphne’s thigh. “I need to be stretched.”

“Four fingers, and sometimes the knuckles. I remember.” She splayed her hand on Astoria’s abdomen under the water, middle finger barely tapping where the plug covered her clit. “I’ve thought so much about you.”

“Every day?”

“Every night. I think about your mouth, your breasts, how your cunt tastes, how you scream when I spank it with a brush.”

“Fuck, Daph.”

“You belong to me.”

Her nails clawed at Astoria’s ribs. They would leave long weals, and crescent bruises at the end where there was an extra dig in. The bath water moved in waves as she squealed.

“Bed,” Daphne said.

They left the bath half full and pulled one another up the stairs, laughing and naked and not caring who knew or saw. Daphne was strong enough to pick Astoria up and toss her on the bed, where she bounced with a little huff before lying still. The plug was removed and she felt empty, fluid trickling down the side of her cunt from where it’d been kept in for hours.

“Be as loud as you want.”

She licked up Astoria’s thigh to her clit, damp hair hanging around her face and between her breasts- Astoria had no idea when she’d gotten naked and didn’t really care. She’d stayed celibate her entire pregnancy and the entire period afterwards and she needed this like breathing.

“Fingers,” she groaned, and Daphne gave them to her. Daphne, her beloved, her flesh, the only one of the Greengrass family who could love her, her blood. After twenty years her heart still beat faster at the sound of her voice, and she cried every week that they were apart.

“Talk to me.”

“I missed you, Daphne.”

“Keep going.”

“I missed you, I missed you, I missed you- oh!”

There were already three fingers inside her and Daphne was trying to squeeze a fourth but her cunt spasmed and she came too soon.

“I didn’t say you could do that.”

“Sorry.”

Daphne pinched Astoria until she squealed, labia and vulva and the soft stretch of skin where her legs folded. “I know you couldn’t help it.”

Mollified, Daphne went back to eating her out. In their usual system Daphne was stone; she needed nothing more than to know that she was driving Astoria wild to feel satisfied. Occasionally she’d let Astoria touch her breasts and bite her neck but on a night such as this she had a singular focus.

“Always mine,” she sighed, fitting the fourth finger into Daphne.

“Always yours. Twenty years. It’s not right-”

“What?”

“-not right that you have to share me, god, Daph, don’t stop.”

Once her body had been pulled up to the point of orgasm Astoria could have several go rolling, soaking into the sheets under her hips and shaking. Sweat foamed up on her sides like a horse that had been run too hard and she asked for more.

“You’re my favorite,” she said after she lost count. “Favorite, favorite, favorite, favorite.”

“I’m your only sister.”

“My favorite lover.”

“I’m your only lover, unless you count that marriage of convenience as anything.” She crawled back up Astoria’s body and kissed her on the mouth, soaked hands groping at her breasts. “Tomorrow we’re making breakfast together. Eggs and toast points and kipper and fruit salad.”

“And then?”

“We can sit in the sunroom and I’ll kiss you all over, or I can tie you up and use you as a footstool. Whatever we want to do. This is our vacation.”

Daphne’s thumb rubbed a circle over Astoria’s heart, hair matted to her forehead with sweat. The other half of Astoria’s body, her life companion, born to serve. Heart’s desire, love’s one true wish, the only name ever on her lips. Daphne!


End file.
